Theseus, Ariadne, King Minos, the Minotaur, Daedalus, and the Labyrinth - these names, the associated myths and the island of Crete have always fascinated me. This Post is a photo essay of the culture of the Minoans taken from my recent visit (Fall, 2012) to Crete.
The Minoan Culture dates from about 3200 BCE, when new settlers arrived on Crete, to about 1450 BCE with the arrival of the Mycenaean Greeks (Greeks of Homer's Iliad) who were their conquerors.
During this time the Minoans developed an extraordinarily sophisticated culture with beautiful examples of pottery, frescoes, jewelry, and architecture. I'll explore this in the following slideshows.
The Prepalatial Period (3200/3000 - 2000)
We see the sense of design and grace in their pottery, examples of their fascination with bulls, as well as openness in sexuality in their fertility object.
The Minoan Culture dates from about 3200 BCE, when new settlers arrived on Crete, to about 1450 BCE with the arrival of the Mycenaean Greeks (Greeks of Homer's Iliad) who were their conquerors.
During this time the Minoans developed an extraordinarily sophisticated culture with beautiful examples of pottery, frescoes, jewelry, and architecture. I'll explore this in the following slideshows.
The Prepalatial Period (3200/3000 - 2000)
We see the sense of design and grace in their pottery, examples of their fascination with bulls, as well as openness in sexuality in their fertility object.
In the Old Palace Period, as you might have guessed, we see the erection of palaces, such as at Knossos. Jewelry and flamboyantly decorated pottery suitable for lavish banquets appear. Swords with gold repousse hilt, hardly suitable for warfare, are found.
This period ended abruptly in 1700 BCE, probably in an earthquake,
The Final Palatial Period - Arrival of the Mycenaean Greeks (1400 - 1350 BCE)
The New Palace Period comes back even more vigorous than ever. The cool thing about this period for the tourist today is that we can get a sense of what it was like to visit a 'New Palace' in its heyday. This is because of the efforts of Sir Arthur Evans, a wealthy British archaeologist. At the turn of the 20th Century, Sir Arthur excavated the area about 6 km south of the capitol of Crete, Iraklio. He discovered an extensive Bronze Age site. Also discovered on the surface were later-era Roman coins inscribed with the name Knos on one side and and image of the Minotaur or Labyrinth on the other. Knos was the ancient Greek city of Crete, the name Knossos for the archaeological site.
Evans not only excavated the site but also attempted to recreate the some of the original structures of the site. For better or worse, his inspirational, and well intended, and sometimes very fanciful attempts to 'conserve' the site is now part of the archaeological record of the site (more than 50 years old, so it's archaeological, by American standards, anyway).
It is great fun to wander around the site (which I spent the entire day doing) getting a little feel of what it must have been like to experience Minoan life 3500 years ago. It is imperative to see the Iraklio Archaeological Museum (really an art museum) in conjunction with a visit to Knossos. All the incredible art including the fabulous frescoes of Bull Jumping, the gorgeous Dancing Lady, La Parisienne, the Ladies in Blue, are in the Museum. What's at the site are all copies.
When I visited, the Iraklio Archaeological Museum was moving to a new building and most of the frescoes are there but not yet open to the public. The Bull Jumping and the Dancing Lady are the only ones on view at the time. Therefore, the image you see in the slideshow are off the internet (except for the Bull Jumping and the Dancing Lady.)
Women appear to dominate Minoan society. Nearly all the figures represented in the frescoes and sculptures are women - gorgeous, stylish, powerful, self-confident women - most strikingly, with open bodices exposing their ample breasts. They are so modern looking, thus the name La Parisienne for one of them. One quote I love made by an archaeologist was that '... I'm not sure that the bottom that sat on the throne in the Throne Room at Knossos wasn't female'. This might have been a matriarchal society.
I'm lumping the New-Palace Period and the Final Palatian Periods together as Evans did when he attempted to reconstruct the Knossos. I'll be mixing images from Knossos with images from the Museum.
Around 1450 BCE the Minoans suffered another natural catastrophe. All the palaces on Crete ceased to be occupied except for the one at Knossos. In about 1420 BCE the mainland Mycenaean Greeks occupied Knossos. At this time in the archaeological remains the script of the Minoans, Linear A, is replace by the script of the Mycenaean Greeks, Linear B, the script of the ancient Greek language.
One final note: If you look closely at some of the frescoes you will notice that the image is based on only a few fragments. Just as the reconstruction of Knossos is drawn partly from the the informed imagination of Sir Arthur, some of the frescoes are partly creations of his talented draftsmen. We have to be a bit careful how we interpret these artifacts.
Hope you have enjoyed this trip through the world of the Minoans.
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